Liquor, Flu and
Governor
Some weeks ago a citizen of northern Richmond county, C.J.
McKay wrote to Governor Bickett requesting five gallons of whiskey be sent to
him to help in combatting the flu. To the request the
Governor replied as
follows:
Raleigh, Jan. 6th
Dear Sir:
Your letter of recent date, requesting that the Governor
send you ten gallons of good whiskey for use in nursing patients suffering with
influenza, has been received. I reply I beg to advise that it is impossible for
the Governor to fill your order, as he has not a drop. If we had that much
liquor this office would feel impelled to turn it over to the State Treasurer
to be used as a basis for the bond issue to raise funds with which to meet the
government half-way in its appropriation to build good roads in North Carolina.
You say, yourself, that a poor man can’t get it. This being true, then it would
be impossible, of course, for the Governor to keep himself supplied on the
salary he now received.
Yours very truly,
Sanford Martin,
Private Secretary
And now Mr. McKay has again written the Governor on the
subject of whiskey-for-flu, as follows:
Pekin, Feb. 7th
Dear Guvner:
I received your reply to my letter. Am sorry you did not
send me the five gallons of whiskey to be used in fighting the flu and sorry to
know that the salary paid to such a valuable office is to insignificant to
afford the amount requested and if said amount was available and sold and the
money appropriated as suggested by you I venture to say that it would not build
thirty steps of good roads in Montgomery county. Now dear Gouvenor while I am
indeed sorry that you are not able to supply me I must confess that I of late
had been extremely lucky and if you should happen to suffer an attack of the
flu do me the honor to write me and I will send you five gallons of the best
whiskey made around here which in fact is sufficint in its quality to make the
ears of a Jack mule stand straight but please ask your secretary not to claim
the flu for either you or himself until he really has it for camaflageing will
not be accepted in this proposition but my dear Gouvenor if the flu serves all
alike I trust that you will have no occasion to ask for this free will offering
and now Gouvenor I am going to ask you not to say much about my proposition for
some one might ask from whence Johnnie came. I will close by saying that I hope
that within the next year the salary of your office may be increased to double
its present proportion. I am your ardent supporter
C.J. McKay
-=-
From the Rockingham Post-Dispatch, Thursday, Feb.
13, 1919
Still Captured
Sheriff McDonald, with deputy collectors Shores and Kenley,
brought in a still on Thursday afternoon of last week from Steele’s township, a
short distance north of the steel bridge on Little river. The outfit was nearly
ready for operation, with several hundred gallons of bear ready. The worm was
not found.
-=-
From the Rockingham Post-Dispatch, Thursday, Feb.
13, 1919
Spruill Not Guilty
The sheriff and deputy found at Oscar Spruill’s pig pen,
colored, three miles northwest of town, a barrel that had held still slops, and
200 years from the house were signs where a still had been in operation. On
this evidence he was arrested and Wednesday was given a hearing before Squire
Guthrie; however, Spruill introduced witnesses to show that his children had
rolled the barrel from a swamp “unbeknownst” to him. He was released for lack
of evidence.
-=-
From the Rockingham Post-Dispatch, Thursday, Feb.
13, 1919
Slick Liquor Trick
A colored man named Bob Hamilton, aged over three score and
ten, from lower Wolf Pit, was in town Sat’day, and is minus a ‘ten spot.’
According to his version, he gave another colored man, Reid Adams, and a man
giving his name as “Sam Crawford” $10 in Rockingham to get him a quart of
whiskey. The two went off presumably to get the fiery stuff, but did not
return. Hamilton went alooking for his messengers and finally found Adams.
Adams put up a tale that he too had been buncoed: that he had given the other
fellow $2 to get him some and that he had disappeared with both his money and
that of Hamilton. But the old man evidently didn’t believe this story, for he
insisted on Adams accompanying him to the Mayor’s office where he secured a
warrant for the arrest of the two, charging them with fraud.
Adams was locked
up about dusk Saturday night in the new cell of the Municipal building, while
the officers hunted for the other negro. When they returned after a fruitless
search an hour or so later, the cell was empty and Adams gone. He prided the
cell door open.
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